I have to take some time and formally thank those in the .Net community who
have helped me achieve MCSD either by direct learning or by their webcasts,
articles, or blog posts.
- Noah Coad (MS) – The release manager for VSTS
Dev & Test tools. Noah and I went to college together at Texas A&M University and have been good
friend since. He has done some amazing stuff in his life with software, and
I’ve learned a great deal from him. He is excited about software, and it’s
contagious. - Mike Hnatt – Mike is a good
friend, and an old professor of mine from Texas A&M. He makes a living by
selling custom software to manage fairs and consulting. He’s an inspiration as
well. - Mark Dunn, Carl Franklin, Rory Blyth (.Net Rocks) – My education
in .Net really began in January of 2003. I had poked around with it when it
first came out, but in January, I really got serious with it. The trouble came
when in Feb 2003, I was deployed with my Army Reserve unit to Iraq. I purchased
a Dell laptop over there, and I began reading blogs, articles, and anything .Net
I could get my hands on. This included .Net Rocks, which debuted while I was
over there. I synchronized as much content as possible while connected to the
Net, and I digested it all offline. I have learned a ton from .Net Rocks. I
even had an opportunity to call in to the show from Kuwait. Thanks guys. - Steve Hickman – Hired me for my first programming job. I programmed web
apps for him using IDC/HTX. This is where it all got started. - Scott Mitchell – So many
articles. I’ve learned a great deal from them. I especially enjoyed the series
on Data
Structures that came out while I was overseas. - Scott Bellware (C# MVP) –
Scott is a part of the local Austin, TX .Net User
Group and is big into TDD. I’m just getting started in TDD, and he’s been a
great help here. - Rockford Lhotka – Rocky doesn’t
know me too well, but his articles on SOA and OO are awesome. He spoke at our
user group once, and it blew my mind. If you ever get to hear Rocky speak, take
advantage of it. Also, it’s not very often that I run across another developer
bigger than me (I’m 6’3″, 275lbs) (Rocky is a rock!) - Jeffrey
Richter – The first .Net book I ever read was Mr. Richter’s Applied
Microsoft .Net Framework Programming book. It was like drinking from a fire
hose. I’m better off for it, though. The detail about garbage collection has
enabled me to debug memory problems in my code. I had the pleasure of meeting
Mr. Richter and the whole Wintellect crew when they came to Austin
last month. - Paul Wilson – Specifically,
his master pages controls taught me a lot about the ASP.NET control hierarchies
and the page life cycle. I dove in and extended his controls and have published
my own set here. - Brad Abrams (MS) – I’m sure we’ve
all learned from him in some form, but I thoroughly enjoyed his MSDN TV and .Net
Show appearances. Brad recently visited our User Group, and I had the opportunity to converse
with him over BBQ!
Thank you all for sharing your knowledge.